


False Prophets

by scribefindegil



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Fisherman's Knot side story, Ford In Peril, Gen, Sea Monsters, the old men and the seal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-13
Updated: 2017-01-13
Packaged: 2018-09-17 07:10:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,609
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9310994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scribefindegil/pseuds/scribefindegil
Summary: Just because Stan’s injured and the brothers are trying to sail to port doesn’t mean they can avoid anomalies altogether.Set between Chapters 12 and 13 of Fisherman’s Knot.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a Fluffstravaganza commission for dana-willowfeather

It was supposed to be a simple matter of getting directions.

Of course, Ford chided himself, nothing he did could ever be simple. There must be some unwritten law of the universe, nay, multiverse, against Stanford Pines ever getting any kind of break. All he’d wanted to do was make sure they were on the fastest route to Boston, out of the path of any storms or ice shoals. It was a simple enough request.

And yes, he could have just thrown the King Cod back into the ocean instead of taking it up on its offer to help them in exchange for its life, but they’d used prophetic fish to navigate before and it had turned out fine! He should have had no problem answering its riddles! And—all right, really he should just stop making excuses and see if there was anything useful he could do before he lost consciousness and was dropped into the maw of a horrific sea monster. Maws? There might have been more than one of them. He hadn’t been able to get a good look before his vision started going spotty.

The writhing mass of coils that were wrapped around him grew tighter, and Ford felt the last gasp of air squeezed from his lungs. His chest was burning and he was sure his ribs were creaking like an old battered ship about to succumb to the storm.

He strained every muscle he could. He bit at the serpent’s leathery skin, his teeth sinking into its flesh and his mouth filling with salt and slime. The thing probably didn’t even notice. If it did, the little damage he could do was comparable to a biting insect—annoying at worst, and more likely to lead to swatting than any real harm.

Or perhaps human saliva was toxic and he’d bring down the beast eventually. Cold comfort, but it was the kind he’d taken before. He had always managed to escape before actually dying, though. Well, obviously. He wasn’t dead yet. He was . . .

Rambling. Self-defense, letting the brain focus on something other than the fact that its time was rapidly running out. Not a very useful self-defense mechanism as these things went. It might be if there was anything he could do, but he was trapped and his head was full of needles and his lungs were full of fire and—

“Hey fish-face!”

Ford could breathe.

He gulped air down into his oxygen-starved lungs until his heart rate steadied and his vision cleared, and then turned his head toward the voice. Stan stood there, gripping the rail of the boat with one white-knuckled hand. He was pale and tousle-haired and his right arm was still bound to his chest, but he stood up tall and smirked at the serpent, a fiery glint in his eyes.

“I got a proposition for you.”

*

It was hard to make coffee with one hand. It was hard to do much of anything. Stan set a bad example for Nuala when it came to silverware, shoveling food straight into his mouth so that he didn’t have to cut it. On the first day he’d needed Ford to help him get dressed, and his five o’ clock shadow was turning into a real beard now that he didn’t trust himself with a razor.

Fortunately, Ford had a tendency to leave forgotten half-drunk cups of coffee scattered around the boat. They were usually too cold for the sugar to dissolve, but they were better than nothing. Better than asking Ford for help.

He’d give it, of course. That wasn’t the problem. In fact it seemed like he’d done nothing _but_ help since they’d returned from Atlantis—always making sure that Stan was warm enough, that he’d eaten, that the painkillers were working. He was starting to feel like a spoiled kid, or one of those stupid little dogs people carried around in handbags—the kind that couldn’t do anything on their own and only existed so that a certain type of people had something to dote on.

There was a mug on the table, barely touched and still warm, next to a pile of Ford’s notes. Ha. That was more like it. If he drank that it would just be stealing, not charity.

Stan sat down and dumped a mountain of sugar into the coffee. Now Ford wouldn’t make him give it back.

He’d taken his first sip when the hatch swung open and Nuala stalked inside.

“Hey!” Stan called. “Why the long face?”

The selkie sat down across from him and flopped headfirst into the pile of care package goodies they hadn’t figured out how to put away yet. When she sat up her mouth was full of chocolate-chip cookies.

She started to say something, remembered that she needed to swallow, and chewed her way through the rest of the cookies in a shower of crumbs.

“Stanford says I’m not allowed to eat fish with hats,” she said. “I caught one but he took it away to argue with and then he laughed at me.”

“Ford?”

“The fish.”

Hat . . . they’d run into one or two of those before, hadn’t they? Stan flipped through the notes in front of him. Selkies . . . yetis . . . merfolk . . . notes on the golden nautilus, overwritten with angry red ink . . . and . . . there!

“Like this?” he asked, holding up a page labeled “Riddle-Me Fish”.

Nuala scowled and pointed and the middle drawing. “The fancy one.”

“King Cod,” Stan read. “This creature will share its supernatural and prophetic blah blah blah . . . riddle contest? Is my brother out there having nerd talk with a fish?”

Nuala shrugged, and Stan felt a pang of jealousy at how easily she moved her shoulders. “It said he got one free question for saving its life but if he wanted anything complicated they needed to have a ‘battle of wits.’ Stanford got all giggleflappy about it. That’s when I left.”

Stan sighed fondly. Of course Ford would get excited at the chance to prove that he was smarter than a magic fish. As long as it gave him something to focus on besides hovering around Stan like a broody hen, Stan was fine with it.

They’d run into a few of the fish before—mostly caught in the nets, although Ford had reeled one in once. It was surprisingly gracious for something that had just had a hook stabbed through its lip, and had warned them of an upcoming storm that none of their instruments had predicted. It had been one of the crowned fish. The ones that wore top hats were less helpful—they’d tell you things but be awfully snooty about it, so usually Stan had to threaten to fry them a few times before they’d co-operate.

The prophetic lobsters, now—

The boat shook. Stan grabbed onto the table to steady himself, but it didn’t stop him from smacking into the wall. A stab of pain shot through his arm and his vision swam. The coffee tipped over, spilling onto Ford’s notes, and Stan would have stopped to clean them off except he’d heard something from outside right before whatever it was had hit them. Sound didn’t travel well into the cabin—he could tell that Ford had been talking earlier, but he hadn’t been able to make out any of the words. Now he wished that he had.

If he’d known what they were saying, he might also know what had made his brother scream.

Stan grabbed the notes about the Riddle-Me Fish and shoved the damp pages into his coat pocket.

“What was—” Nuala began.

“Don’t know, but I’ll bet you anything we’re about to find out!” Stan stood and stumbled for the hatch, Nuala close at his heels.

He turned back towards her. “No, you wait.” He said. “Wait and listen. We may need the element of surprise.”

Nuala nodded grimly and let him go ahead.

There was a monster in the water beside the boat—some kind of sea serpent. They hadn’t seen one in a while. Weren’t supposed to see them at all, not after they’d painted all those swirly white lines on the bottom of the boat to confuse their silhouette. Ford had been so proud of himself when he figured that out.

Ford—

Far above the boat he could see a pair of worn boots and a shock of gray hair among the serpent’s coils. The boots were kicking and the hair was tossing back and forth. Still alive. Stan breathed out.

The serpent had no eyes but it had an enormous mouth, long and cavernous and lined with serrated teeth as far back as Stan could see. Seaweed hung from its face and one long whiskerlike tendril draped down its neck, the fancy-hatted fish at the end of it.

All right. He had one working arm and no weapons and only the sketchiest idea of what he was up against. Story of his life.

Stan stepped up to the rail and shouted.

*

“This is a terrible idea!” Ford tried to yell, but even with the serpent’s hold on him loosened he didn’t have enough breath in him to speak. _He_ hadn’t been able to answer the fish—the serpent—the _creature’s_ riddle. Stan didn’t have a chance.

The thing closed its mouth and moved its head closer to the boat, stopping just a few inches away from Stan’s face. He kept glaring at it, but Ford watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. He wasn’t even wearing a proper coat, just rushing out headlong into danger like he always did. It would be impressive if it wasn’t so infuriating.

The sea serpent loomed above Stan and the tendril . . . appendage? Line? The . . . thing that anchored the crown of the serpent’s head to the King Cod twisted itself up so that the fish hovered high above the boat, its crown glinting in the sunlight. It was the fish that spoke. As far as he could tell, the serpent only roared.

“We must engage in a battle of wits,” said the creature. Exactly what it had said to him. As it spoke, it shifted its coils until Ford was dangling upside-down, one ankle held by the tip of the serpent’s tail.

“Stan, you shouldn’t—” he tried, just in time to hear, “All right, then. Double or nothing. I win and you let my brother go. You win and I’ll hop right into your mouth, no questions asked.”

“Don’t!” Ford yelled. “Stanley, it’s not—”

“Not a problem, exactly!” Stan looked up and grinned at him. He . . . wasn’t nervous. Or if he was he was doing an excellent job of hiding it. But Ford was getting better at noticing his brother’s tells, and Stan was grinning without that extra tension around his eyes or the too-wide Mr. Mystery smile.

“You must answer my riddle to win your boon,” said the creature.

Stan locked eyes with the King Cod and flashed his teeth. “Come on, fishy. Hit me with your best shot.”

_“I wind at those whales gray-haired, living I thirst;_

_Togetherless the waves, racing some rain useful to shore,_

_Most skillfully, liberal with me, I suffer hurt._

_I am the darkness of the earth;_

_Be silent, but I shape, scarred by iron_

_And pass men in the honeycombing_

_Over them an often-giver of victories, created gold._

_I keep my snow half-hides the whirlwind to my lord_

_Beneath the key's power he has not eaten;_

_I was left no creature. Ever the Lord's bidding overed me,_

_The Image for Answer_ _?”_

 

The same riddle it had asked him. Ford held his breath, dangling there from the serpent’s tail with the crash of the waves and the rush of his blood pounding in his ears. He was helpless as he watched his brother stare down the monster. His defiance was admirable, but defiance wasn’t what they needed right now. They needed weaponry, they needed intellect, they needed answers. Ford should have been able to answer the question. He was the one who protected them from this sort of danger, but he couldn’t even solve a simple riddle, and now they were both going to—

The serpent shook its tail and opened its mouth wider. It might have been light-headedness or the oddness of perspective that came from being upside-down, but it looked like Stan smiled.

“Easy,” he said. “You’re a fish stuck to a snake who can’t tell a real riddle to save your own creepy-looking skin.”

Ford was too stunned to respond. Perhaps the King Cod was, too, because Stan went on, “You’re not one of those magic fish at all. You’re just a two-bit con artist designed to catch nerds, and believe me, as a two-bit con artist myself, you aren’t even doing it right. People are supposed to think you’re harmless right up until you’ve caught ‘em in that big snakey mouth of yours. But I already knew what you are. Big mistake to stick around once you’ve lost the element of SURPRISE!”

He shouted the last word and then ducked down behind the rail, and then—

Ford had always turned his back when Nuala transformed. He could tell that it took her longer to shed her sealskin than to put it back on, but it still seemed like an ungainly process.

He would never have imagined that she could change in midair. But it was a woman who came barreling out of the cabin and leapt over the rail and a seal that opened its mouth and caught the false King Cod up in a blur of silver and a snap of teeth. Ford had approximately five seconds of unabashed wonder before the serpent convulsed, releasing his ankle and dropping him headfirst into the sea.

*

“So how many times am I going to have to fish you out of the ocean?”

Ford sipped at his coffee and shivered under yet another mound of blankets.

“I live in hope that this will be the last.”

Stan scoffed, rubbing a towel affectionately into Ford’s hair. “Not likely. This one’s a born troublemaker.”

Nuala headbutted his good shoulder. “Speak for yourself.”

“Hey!” Stan drew back in mock horror. “Who was it that saved our butts back there?”

“Me!” said Nuala. She grinned at them toothily. “And if Stanford had just let me eat that fish to begin with things would have been fine.”

“You were amazing back there,” said Ford. He looked up at his brother. “Both of you. How did you know what to do? I would have just kept arguing with it until it ate me.”

Stan clapped him on the back. “Well, that’s what you need me for! Did you really not notice that its crown was made of shiny scales instead of gold?”

“Not at all,” Ford admitted. “I was too drawn in by its—”

“Totally meaningless riddles? I gotta tell you, bro, sometimes things don’t make sense just because they don’t make sense.”

Ford sighed. “I suppose you’re right. Still, it’s fascinating! Anomalies disguised as other anomalies! I’ve never seen a sea serpent with a lure, and certainly not one capable of speech! I’ll need to completely overhaul my classification scheme!”

Stan snorted. “Nerd.”

“Trickster.”

Nuala rolled her eyes. “Humans.”

Ford extricated a dry page from the coffee-stained piles on the table and began scribbling furiously.

“You’re still shivering,” said Stan. “Let yourself warm up first, knucklehead.”

Ford stood and shuffled over to the stove, blankets swishing along the floor behind him. Hot chocolate it was.

“And make some coffee for me, willya?” said Stan. “I deserve it if I’ve gotta be the smart one today.”

Ford smiled, shook his head, and put on the pot.

**Author's Note:**

> The false King Cod's riddle was created using a predictive text emulator and a set of Anglo-Saxon riddles from the Exteter Book.


End file.
